On Nationalism

Author(s): Danilo Kis

Source: Performing Arts Journal, Vol. 18, No. 2 (May, 1996), pp. 13-17
Published by: Performing Arts Journal, Inc.
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 ON NATIONALISM

Danilo Kis

^F
_irst of all, nationalismis paranoia-collective and individualparanoia.As a
collective nationalismis born out of fearand But above it
paranoia, envy. all,
appearsas a resultof an individual'slost consciousness.Therefore,collective
paranoiais nothing else but a summaryof many individualparanoiasbrought
together to a level of paroxysm.If an individualis not able to "express"himself
within the frameworkof his givensociety,or if that givensocietydoes not stimulate
him as an individual,or if disqualifieshim-that is, if the societydoes not allowhim
to discoverhis own entity-then that individualis forced to look for his entity
outside the society'sidentityand outsidesociety'ssocialstructures.In so doing, the
individualbecomes a memberof a clandestinegroup whose goal and task is, or
seemsto be, to solveproblemsof monumentalimportance:a survivaland prestigeof
that group'snation. It seeksto preserveits nationaltradition,values,and relics,its
nationalfolklore,philosophy,ethics,literature,etc. Obsessedwith that secret,semi-
public or public mission,our Mr.X becomesa man of action, a nationaltribune,a
pseudo-individual.And now, when he is broughtdown to earth, to his own size,
when he is isolatedfromthe facelesscrowdand removedfromthe post wherehe has
placed himself, or where others have placed him, we have before our eyes an
individualwithout individuality,a nationalist,Cousin Jules. He is the same Jules
Sartrewroteabout,Juleswho is no one in the family,a nil, and whose only virtueis
to turn red wheneverthe word "Englishmen"is mentioned.That pale face, that
fever, that "secret"of his to know how to become pale when Englishmen are
mentioned, that is his only social entity. It makes him importantand proveshis
existence.

For god'ssakedon'tmention Englishtea beforehim. Immediatelyall of the people

at the tablewill startto giveyou signals,to kickyou underthe tablebecauseCousin
Jules is very sensitiveabout the Englishmen.They all know Cousin Jules hates
Englishmen.He loves his own, the Frenchmen.As a matterof fact, Julesbecomes
individual,someone, thanksto Englishtea.

This picturecould be an accurateportraitof all nationalistsand could be definedas

follows:a nationalist,almostby rule, as a social being and individual,is a negative
figure-a nothingness.That is, by definition, he is a cipher. Actually, he has

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neglected his home and family, his job (usually he is a bureaucrat), his literature (if
he is a writer at all), his community service and public responsibilities, because all
these things are insignificant in comparison to his messianism. Needless to say, he is
an ascetic by choice, a potential warrior who awaits his moment. Nationalism is, as
Sartre would put it arguing about anti-Semitism, "a total and free choice, a global
stand that one has not only toward other nations, but toward people in general, and
toward history and society as well. It is simultaneously both a passion and a world
view." A nationalist is, by definition, an ignorant. Nationalism is therefore a stage of
spiritual laziness and conformity.

For a nationalist everything is easy because he knows, or he thinks that he knows, his
qualities, values, and abilities. That is, he knows the qualities of his nation, he knows
his nation's ethical and political values. And of course he is not interestedin and does
not care about the others. The others are hell (other nations, other tribes). And he
does not need any information about them. The nationalist sees and recognizes in
the others only himself-the nationalist. As we said earlier, it is a very comfortable
situation. Fear and Envy. According to the national matrix, the nationalist believes
that not only the others are hell, but everything which is not his (Serbian, Croatian,
French .. .) is alien to him.

Nationalism is an ideology of banality. Nationalism, therefore, is a totalitarian

ideology. Nationalism, in fact, is not only in its etymological sense, but by definition
as well, the last remaining ideology and demagogy which addresses the nation'.
Writers know that very well. That is why every writer who declares that he writes
"from and for the people," who says that he subordinates his individual voice to that
higher call-the national interest-should be suspected as a nationalist. National-
ism is kitsch. In the Serbo-Croatian version it is a struggle for dominance over the
national origin of Ginger-Bread Heart2.

Usually a nationalist neither speaks any foreign language nor knows a variation of
his own, nor knows anything about other cultures. He is not interested in them. But
this is not that simple. If he speaks by some chance some foreign language, and
accordingly, as an intellectual, has some knowledge about the cultural heritage of
some other nation, then he uses that knowledge only to draw analogies which will
undermine that other nation. Kitsch and folklore, or rather folkloric kitsch, is
nothing else but disguised nationalism. It is fertile ground for nationalistic ideology.
The expansion of folklore in the world today is not a product of increased interest
in anthropology but of the rise of nationalism. Insisting on the outspoken phrase
couleur locale (especially if it is out of some literary context and if it does not serve
the artistic truth) is also nothing else but one version of hidden nationalism.
Nationalism is therefore and, above all, a negative spiritual category, because
nationalism is based on and lives by denial and on denial. We are not those people
who they are. We are the positive pole; they are the negative one. Our national
values, our nationalistic values, have some function only if we compare them with
others: we are nationalists, but they are worse than we are. We slaughter (only when

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we have to), but they slaughter even more than we do. We are drunkards, but they
are alcoholics. Our history is accurate only in relationto theirs. Our language is pure
only if comparedto theirs.

Nationalism is fed by relative notions. There are no general ethical or aesthetic

values. For the nationalists there are only relative values. In that sense, nationalism
is a rigid conservatism and a return to the past. You just have to be better than your
brother or half-brother; the rest is not important at all. A nationalist does not care
about anything else. What he wants is just to jump a little bit higher than his
brother. Who cares about the others!!That is what I call fear.The rest of the world
has a right to be better than we are, to get ahead of us; we don't care about that. The
goals of nationalism are always achievable goals. They are achievable because they
are ordinary, and they are ordinary because they are sly. You do not jump or shoot
to score a point, to reach the peak of your abilities, but only to defeat, to kill the
others, those so similar and, at the same time, so different from you. They are the
main reason for the whole game. A nationalist is not afraid of anything or anyone
but his brother. He is scared of his brother pathologically and existentially: the
victory of his chosen enemy is to him his own, absolute defeat. It means annihilation
of his entire being. Since he is a coward and zilch, a nationalist does not have higher
goals. The victory over his chosenenemy, that other one, is his highest victory. That
is why nationalism is an idea of misery, an ideology of a possible victory, a
guaranteed victory, and not quite definite, final defeat. The nationalist is not afraid
of anyone, "anyone but God," and his god is made on his own terms and in his own
image-his pale Cousin Jules. And he is: his brother who lives next door, his
neighbor who is as incapable as he himself is, his cousin who is a "pride of the
family," who is a good citizen, an organized member of the family and/or a
conscious part of the nation-that pale Cousin Jules.

We have said that to be a nationalist means to be individual without obligations.

"The nationalist is a coward who does not like to admit that he is a coward; a killer
who suppresses his affinity for killing, incapable of suppressing that feeling but also
incapable of committing such crime in public. He can do that, he can kill only if he
is hidden, only from the unanimity of the crowd. He is an unsatisfied individual
who is afraid to rebel because he is afraid of the consequences of his rebellion"-
these are the real features of Sartre'santi-Semite mentioned earlier.

And we wonder now where does this cowardice, this rise of nationalism come from
in our time? Suppressed as an individual by different ideologies and thrown on the
fringes of social movements this person is in fact smashed and lost between
confronted ideologies. By the same token he is immature and incapable of
individual rebellion because he does not possess real intellectual drive for that. In
that way this individual has found himself in a crack, in a limbo, because he is a
social being who does not participate in social life. As an individual, he needs to
participate in social life, but his individualism is suppressed in the name of
ideologies. What is left to him in that situation is nothing else but to look for his

KIS / On Nationalism * 15

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social being somewhereelse.The nationalist is a frustrated and confused individual,
while nationalism is a collective expression of frustratedindividualism. It is ideology
and anti-ideology at the same time.

(Excerpted from Kis's book Cas Anatomije

[The Anatomy Lesson], pp. 29-33, Nolit. Beograd, 1978)

NOTES

1. Kis usesthe word "nation"("narod"in Serbianor Croatian)in termsof ethnos(a group

of peoplebound togetherby the sameethnicspecifics),not nationin termsof demos(people
of differentethnic backgrounds).
2. Ginger-BreadHeartis a homemadecolorfulcookie in the shapeof a heartand sold at
country fairs by Serbian and Croatian peasants from Vojvodina and Slovenia. Like
Valentine'sDay gifts, it is exchangedas a sign of love.

DANILO KIS (1935-1989), best known abroad for his novel A Tombfor
Boris Davidovic, was one of the most eminent novelists and most daring
anti-Stalinist thinkers in the former Yugoslavia. Shortly after the book was
published, the Yugoslav Writers Union impugned Kis's reputation by
accusing him of plagiarism, a claim politically motivated and initiated by
Serbian nationalists. The author counterattacked by publishing his brilliant
collection of polemical essays The Anatomy Lesson.He lived out the rest of
his life in exile in Paris.

PERFORMING ARTS JOURNAL, NO. 53 (1996) PP. 13-16: ? 1996

The Johns Hopkins University Press

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 Sarajevo 1993. Postcard by Dalida Durakovic and
Bojan Hadzihalilovic.

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